Research objective: Cultural diversity among patients and providers influences health services research in ways not clearly understood. While psychologists have developed a number of psychosocial or sociocognitive models to study the relationship between individual and community health beliefs and health behaviors, culture is often treated as a marginal phenomenon. Frequently health services and nursing researchers also fail to account for differences resulting from the influence of culture. This poster presents an overview of cultural consensus analysis as a research methodology along with an example of its application to health services research, specifically preventive health services research. Study Design. Cultural consensus analysis is both a theory and a mathematical model for studying culture developed by network analysts and cognitive anthropologists. Its foundation is the belief that culture can be defined as a ‘shared knowledge base, as such it can be measured with validity and reliability. Instead of treating “culture” as an homogeneous entity and informant responses to queries about culture as definitive, consensus analysis assumes that culture consists of knowledge that is unequally distributed according to categories such as gender, ethnicity, age and the division of labor. In studying culture as knowledge, it asks three main questions: 1. Is there sufficient homogeneity among informant responses to survey items to warrant the assumption of “shared knowledge” or “cultural consensus”; 2. What is the relationship between the knowledge possessed by the sample as an aggregate and each informant; and 3. What are the “culturally correct” answers to the survey items. Mathematically, consensus analysis is based on factor analysis and can obtain significant results with very small sample sizes. Setting: Cultural consensus analysis is presented as it was applied to a preventive health services research study. This study compared high-risk urban adolescent perceptions of youth violence with those of community leaders from the same upstate New York City. Responses were entered into data matrices and analyzed for consensus using the software package Anthropac ® (Analytic Technologies, Natick, MA). Principal Findings and Conclusion: Cultural consensus analysis is a useful tool for studying local understandings of disease risk and health related behaviors. Using this method, it was possible to determine that the subjects share cultural knowledge in the domain under investigation, and to discern important differences between people based on age or gender. The policy implications of these results are significant. With this methodology, analysts account for the cultural diversity that often influences research results, yet is rarely accounted for. Sensitivity to this hidden bias has tremendous value for enhancing nursing and health services research design.

<table><tr><td colspan="2" class="item-title">Cultural Consensus Analysis: A methodological application for Preventive Health Services Research</td></tr><tr class="item-sponsor"><td class="label">Conference Sponsor:</td><td class="value">Sigma Theta Tau International</td></tr><tr class="item-year"><td class="label">Conference Year:</td><td class="value">2001</td></tr><tr class="item-conference-date"><td class="label">Conference Date:</td><td class="value">November 10 - 14, 2001</td></tr><tr class="item-author"><td class="label">Author:</td><td class="value">Veenema, Tener</td></tr><tr class="item-institute"><td class="label">P.I. Institution Name:</td><td class="value">University of Rochester</td></tr><tr class="item-email"><td class="label">Email:</td><td class="value">tener_veenema@urmc.rochester.e</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2" class="item-abstract">Research objective: Cultural diversity among patients and providers influences health services research in ways not clearly understood. While psychologists have developed a number of psychosocial or sociocognitive models to study the relationship between individual and community health beliefs and health behaviors, culture is often treated as a marginal phenomenon. Frequently health services and nursing researchers also fail to account for differences resulting from the influence of culture. This poster presents an overview of cultural consensus analysis as a research methodology along with an example of its application to health services research, specifically preventive health services research. Study Design. Cultural consensus analysis is both a theory and a mathematical model for studying culture developed by network analysts and cognitive anthropologists. Its foundation is the belief that culture can be defined as a &lsquo;shared knowledge base, as such it can be measured with validity and reliability. Instead of treating &ldquo;culture&rdquo; as an homogeneous entity and informant responses to queries about culture as definitive, consensus analysis assumes that culture consists of knowledge that is unequally distributed according to categories such as gender, ethnicity, age and the division of labor. In studying culture as knowledge, it asks three main questions: 1. Is there sufficient homogeneity among informant responses to survey items to warrant the assumption of &ldquo;shared knowledge&rdquo; or &ldquo;cultural consensus&rdquo;; 2. What is the relationship between the knowledge possessed by the sample as an aggregate and each informant; and 3. What are the &ldquo;culturally correct&rdquo; answers to the survey items. Mathematically, consensus analysis is based on factor analysis and can obtain significant results with very small sample sizes. Setting: Cultural consensus analysis is presented as it was applied to a preventive health services research study. This study compared high-risk urban adolescent perceptions of youth violence with those of community leaders from the same upstate New York City. Responses were entered into data matrices and analyzed for consensus using the software package Anthropac &reg; (Analytic Technologies, Natick, MA). Principal Findings and Conclusion: Cultural consensus analysis is a useful tool for studying local understandings of disease risk and health related behaviors. Using this method, it was possible to determine that the subjects share cultural knowledge in the domain under investigation, and to discern important differences between people based on age or gender. The policy implications of these results are significant. With this methodology, analysts account for the cultural diversity that often influences research results, yet is rarely accounted for. Sensitivity to this hidden bias has tremendous value for enhancing nursing and health services research design.</td></tr></table>

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dc.date.available

2011-10-26T09:32:37Z

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dc.date.issued

2001-11-10

en_GB

dc.date.accessioned

2011-10-26T09:32:37Z

-

dc.description.sponsorship

Sigma Theta Tau International

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